Most dangerous thing U have ever done with any vehicle

When I think back on those days I get goosebumps , lol , had a lot of fun but holy shit at the condition we used to drive home in ... yikes

 

On a zx6r, passing a vehicle in Deals Gap nc at the absolute wrong time. Luckily squeezed between oncoming car and car I was passing, while leaned over, mid corner! Young and stupid. Just inches from being turned into a vegetable. Rode home under the speed limit and never cut it that close again. 100,000 miles of seat time later, mostly mountains, and still here. Although I don't ride anymore, why didn't someone tell me those things where so uncomfortable.

 

Ok… I’ll play… It’s about 1988 and I’m on my second car I upgraded from a piece of garbage 1978 Ford Pinto wagon (with faux wood paneling) to a 1980 Chevette... for you “youngsters” out there… that’s not auto-correct… it was a Chevette, not a Corvette… a chick-magnet none-the-less

Anyway… the brakes were just completely shot on that car, despite my best effort replacing both front and rear pads/shoes. The problem was a crappy master cylinder. But I quickly had the timing down just right… STOP SIGN!!! 150 feet… PUMP THE BRAKES...PUMP, PUMP, PUMP!!!! As I kept pumping, enough pressure would build in the brake lines to s-o-f-t-l-y apply the brakes, so I was able to come to a… uh… semi-full stop… just in time
The same car had a major rust problem… well.. everywhere, but the most notable area was right below my feet on the driver’s side floor. It got so bad that water would rush up and into the car when there was a heavy rain My master-mechanic solution? Put a piece of ply-wood down! In my defense, I’m pretty sure it was 3/4”… but I can’t vouch it was pressure treated to handle the moisture.

Anyway…maybe not as cool as flipping my truck, in a totally insane stunt on the trail… but in retrospect it’s like “HOLY FUCK! I drove like this thing all over the place????”

 

I'd like to say 170mph at an open road race, but honestly that felt pretty safe.

Probably driving drunk decades ago.

Or smashing up a junk car in the woods when I was ~20. My buddy lost control and we hit a tree head on going 20-30mph.

 

Rolled my Jeep TJ going about 85 mph, damn near killed me

 

Geez. Are you typing from this world or the other...?

 

OMG! I drove a Chevette once. What POS!

 

...jumped my single cab 4cyl Tacoma over a 40ft table top style railroad crossing



Actually still drove like new for years after.

 

ohh shiz...

 

100+ MPH in 1968 VW Bug coming down Mammoth pass (back from skiing). The speedo pegged at 80 and I did not feel in control...

 

Well....back in the 60's a buddy and I smoked most of a nickle bag ($5/oz) and headed back into town about sunrise.

At idle.

Which was WAY too fast...totally out of control.

Made it most of the way through town but damn near wrecked trying to avoid hitting his dad as he was walking accross the street on his way to work.

Yeah, still at idle.

 

Took it to a Toyota dealer for free Toyota"Care" service.

 

A piece of shit for sure! I eventually replaced the master cylinder... and it was still a piece of shit but I drove it until the day came for it's last journey to the junk yard... and they even gave me $150 for it!!! That car was my first lesson in road survival

 

This is not the most “dangerous” thing, but pretty dumb nonetheless.

A few years ago I am sitting at home in Los Angeles one balmy Saturday morning in October, looking online for a Streak Blue Dodge Challenger SRT M/T. It is a rare color. Find one sitting at a Dodge dealer in Fort Collins. CO. Call the dealer, agree on a price, they run my credit and hold the car.

I check the drive from Denver to Los Angeles on Google maps: it is about 1,200 miles. Not bad. I’ve done drives that long before. Besides it’s pretty.

I check online and find a $67 one-way Southwest flight from LAX to Denver at noon. It’s a 1:30 hr flight. The dealer says they are picking me up at the airport. I check the time; it’s already close to 9:30am. Not thinking I put on some shorts, a Hawaiian shirt, slip into my flip flops, grab my wallet and my phone and head out the door.

By the time I land in Denver it is already 4:30pm. The salesman shows up 15 or 20 minutes later and picks me up. Little did I know it’s another hour drive to Fort Collins.

Arrive at the dealership past 6pm. The manager has everything ready and waiting. Sign all the papers and head out past 7pm.

By the time I approach Denver it’s already dark. I stay on I-70 westbound. Pass Denver. As I keep going I notice the highway gets curvy. Keep on going. I notice the outside temperature keeps dropping gradually. It was about 60 degrees when I left Ft Collins. By the time I hit Denver it shows 45 degrees. Then it shows 40. Moments later it shows 30. Then I start seeing snow on the side of the road. I check the elevation on the Navi and it reads 5,000 ft and climbing. I go “Shoot, I forgot I have to cross the Rockies!” As I keep climbing the temperature keeps dropping and snowbanks keep getting higher and higher. I think to myself “Here I am driving a RWD car with summer tires, no spare, wearing shorts, Hawaiian shirt and flip flops. If I get a flat tire they won’t find me until spring.” Drive by the ski resorts. There are mounds of snow. It is surreal.

Thankfully nothing bad happens. By 1am I am dead tired and pull into a hotel in a Grand Junction. It is 28 degrees outside. I run out of the car and into the lobby. The kid on duty at the front desk sees the front doors open and this kook appear running in from the cold wearing a Hawaiian shirt, shorts and flip flops. It is a miracle he doesn’t throw me out; he gives me a room.

By 6am I feel well rested. Get back in the car, fill up and continue my journey back to Los Angeles. I make it into L.A. right in time for the end of weekend traffic back into town.

On Monday morning my boss asks “So what did you do last weekend?” “Oh, not much. Bought a car in Denver and drove it home.”

She just gave me a funny look.

Flew into Denver to drive this beauty back to Los Angeles

 

A few things come to mind - nothing too crazy but dangerous nonetheless:

- Triple digit speeds on motorcycles

- Dragging frame in my bagged S-10 down the highway shooting sparks at 70 mph

- Drove my F-150 a couple miles home with next to no brakes (Due to a rusted out front line. Parents yelled at me for dripping brake fluid up the new brick paver driveway lol)

- 17 years old trying to fishtail my Ford Tempo down a dirt road, lost control slid sideways skidding/digging to a stop and car nearly rolled, felt the driver side wheels lift and touch back down

- One night I fell asleep behind the wheel of my 86 Camry, veered off the road and took out a street sign which woke me right up. The next morning I realized the sign dented my roof pretty bad after it snapped lol. Then I drove back to the scene and saw the broken sign post in the ground was about two feet to the left of a telephone pole. Got real lucky there.

 

Still ain’t locked that’s so weird

 

Took an '85 Cavalier up and down some big ass steep hill in Grand Terrace, CA.

 

My first real field job.

We were pulling samples from a drilling rig, only 4 hours away from the lab, which should have been a cake walk. Pulling core samples is an exercise in the hurry up and wait mantra. Typically you show up several hours ahead of time, because you don't know when the core sample is going to reach surface, but you damn sure better be there when it does. A typical job goes like this, show up, chat with the rig boss, chat with the driller, chat with the geologist, nap for a few hours, put in three hours of actual work, drive the samples back to the lab. Cake.

This job was different. The client hired a damn consultant to make sure that their samples were always at the top of the lab's priority list. This consultant was pushing 80, and had the cantankerous take-no-shit attitude of an 80 year old oilfield worker. Traveling to site, leaving Houston at 4 am, we stopped 20 minutes away from the rig for breakfast. Cantankerous old Gary called my supervisor, reaming us for being late to site, and why aren't we here already. (I tried to type old fart but the autocorrect gods decided that Gary made more sense. Fuck it, he's a Gary now.)

I guess we're taking that breakfast to go. We slam the pedal of the POS Isuzu flatbed and arrive 15 minutes later. We make our greetings and apologies to old Gary, and he informs us that the core just finished drilling, it's due to surface in 8 hours. Cool. I find a lull in conversation to excuse myself back to the truck and break into the styrofoam box that holds my breakfast burrito, now rapidly cooling. One bite in, one bite, and Gary points at me. "You, there!" "Yes sir?" Do me a favor and pick up that tool box." "Yes sir, where would you like it moved?" "Just to your left. Put it down there."

Fucking old Gary wasn't about to let us nap. Not on his watch. He made damn sure that we were on our feet for the full 8 hours of waiting. Worse, he didn't let us use power saws to process the 90 ft core into more manageable 3 ft sections. Instead he made us use an old school pipe cutter. I had never seen a pipe cutter capable of scoring a 6" pipe before. This midieval torture device was a hand tool of giant proportions. What was supposed to be a typical three hour job now took six, and it was backbreaking.

And now on to the point of the story, and how it relates to the thread. I was the FNG, the short man on the totem pole. So while the rest of the crew got a hotel in town, it was my job to rush those samples the four hours back to Houston. I reached my apartment at 1 am. 2 hours of sleep, 3:30 am, it's time to wake up, retrieve the work truck, and be on the road in time to be on site by 8. This happened three. days. in. a. row.

Being young and cocksure I lasted all of the second day and most of the third. That third return trip, we packed the truck, I hopped in, and was on the highway for about 30 minutes. Then I blinked. I'm in my car, idling in the parking spot of my apartment. It's 4 am. I had no idea what the hell just happened. No memory, no idea what happened to the work truck, no idea how I found my car. And that's the worst thing I did while driving.

I called my supervisor out of bed and told him I wouldn't be able to make it back on time for round four of hell week, and wouldn't survive if I tried. He left a message a few hours later and said that the truck and samples were fine and they were exactly where they were supposed to be. So I'm guessing that nothing bad happened. But I also can't say for sure.

 

Woooooo don’t think just do it

 

Hitting 112mph in the Taco. Won't say where. Never again tho, too sketchy.